Cotton IPM in Arizona: A Decade of Research, Implementation & Education

Pest management in Arizona during the 1990’s has been filled with unique challenges and solutions. This tumultuous period was dotted with pest outbreaks, grower adaptation and perseverance, and spectacular recovery and progress. The elements that helped broker these tremendous successes cotton growers now enjoy—at least with respect to pest management— were comprised of multiple groups who worked individually and together towards solutions. The University of Arizona, the Land-Grant University in this state, and Cooperative Extension have been at the center of response to many of these imposing challenges to this important industry. This paper briefly details a historical review of the pest pressures and the specific response to one pest in terms of research, implementation, and education. The importance of our mission as a LandGrant institution has been instrumental in catalyzing a multilateral response to and recovery from insect pest pressures that would most assuredly have been fatal to the cotton industry of this state.